Standardization of electrolyte leakage data and a novel liquid nitrogen control improve measurements of cold hardiness in woody tissue.

Background: A variety of basic and applied research programs in plant biology require the accurate and reliable determination of plant tissue cold hardiness. Over the past 50 years, the electrolyte leakage method has emerged as a popular and practical method for quantifying the amount of damage inflicted on plant tissue by exposure to freezing temperatures. Numerous approaches for carrying out this method and analyzing the resultant data have emerged.

X-ray phase contrast imaging of Vitis spp. buds shows freezing pattern and correlation between volume and cold hardiness.

Grapevine (Vitis spp.) buds must survive winter temperatures in order to resume growth when suitable conditions return in spring. They do so by developing cold hardiness through deep supercooling, but the mechanistic process of supercooling in buds remains largely unknown.

Deacclimation kinetics as a quantitative phenotype for delineating the dormancy transition and thermal efficiency for budbreak in species.

Bud dormancy and cold hardiness are critical adaptations for surviving winter cold stress for temperate perennial plant species. In grapevine, acquisition of cold hardiness requires dormancy induction in the early winter and careful maintenance of dormancy state throughout winter. With sufficient exposure to low, non-freezing temperatures (chilling requirement), grapevine buds transition between early (endodormant) and late winter (ecodormant) states.

Transcriptomic Profiling of Acute Cold Stress-Induced Disease Resistance (SIDR) Genes and Pathways in the Grapevine Powdery Mildew Pathosystem.

Temperatures from 2 to 8°C transiently induce quantitative resistance to powdery mildew in several host species (cold stress-induced disease resistance [SIDR]). Although cold SIDR events occur in vineyards worldwide an average of 14 to 21 times after budbreak of grapevine and can significantly delay grapevine powdery mildew () epidemics, its molecular basis was poorly understood. We characterized the biology underlying the cold SIDR phenotype-which peaks at 24 h post-cold (hpc) treatment and results in a 22 to 28% reduction in spore penetration success-through highly replicated ( = 8 to 10) RNA sequencing experiments.

Tempo of gene regulation in wild and cultivated Vitis species shows coordination between cold deacclimation and budbreak.

Dormancy release, loss of cold hardiness and budbreak are critical aspects of the annual cycle of deciduous perennial plants. Molecular control of these processes is not fully understood, and genotypic variation may be important for climate adaptation. To gain greater understanding of these processes, single-node cuttings from wild (Vitis amurensis, V.

Divergence in the transcriptional landscape between low temperature and freeze shock in cultivated grapevine ().

Low-temperature stresses limit the sustainability and productivity of grapevines when early spring frosts damage young grapevine leaves. Spring conditions often expose grapevines to low, but not damaging, chilling temperatures and these temperatures have been shown to increase freeze resistance in other model systems. In this study, we examined whole-transcriptome gene expression patterns of young leaf tissue from cuttings of five different grapevine cultivars, exposed to chill and freeze shock, in order to understand the underlying transcriptional landscape associated with cold stress response.